PhD recruiting for non-MBB firms? And starting positions/levels

I poked around the forums and found some info but some of the info was old(ish) and much of it didn't specify the starting level of PhD consultants. Specifically, I haven't found a lot of information about boutiques or about what's going on with Deloitte after the acquisition of Monitor and PwC after the acquisition of Booz. And Deloitte S&O seems to be separate from Monitor? Not sure what's going on.

M&B (but not the other B), LEK, Clearview and Clarion heavily recruit advanced degree candidates from my school and offers to start you at an MBA equivalent level.

Since it makes a difference in this world, I'm a PhD candidate in bio at an ivy and have extensive leadership experience, but am weak in terms of work experience. Mostly interested in management consulting and entering as a generalist, but am also interested in healthcare/life science boutique firms, as well.

Thanks!

 

Thanks! Yeah, McK and BCG seem to be extremely open to PhDs, which I appreciate. Their recruiting events have been extremely important in terms of my decision to actively pursue consulting as a career path.

I actually ended up realizing that another post (can't post links yet, but called "Post graduate/Masters Degree when applying to consulting" has a similar topic, I must have missed it in my search. It answered some of my questions about OW, but not sure about other firms.

It would be nice if there were a comprehensive list of firms that are open to hiring PhDs. I';m willing to reach out to more firms, but it is hard to decide whether it is worth crafting a new cover letter if the firm is not interested in hiring any PhDs.

 
Best Response

One recommendation- check with the specific office you're applying to which level you join at- it's not always consistent across firms. For example, at McKinsey in most offices outside the US, most PhDs (or MDs) join as a Junior Associate. Promotion to full associate (i.e., MBA equivalent level) happens after 18-24 months. In the US, I understand that the Junior Associate level doesn't exist (I wrote a bit more about this here: http://www.theconsultingcoach.com/articles/whats-the-right-level-or-rol…).

As someone who also came from a science background, I thought joining McKinsey as a Junior Associate was great- it let me build up work experience and try a range of industries before I was expected to perform at the same level as an MBA.

Also, my experience was that working across different industries was one of the best things about being a consultant and something I'm very glad that I didn't miss out on by going to a life sciences/ healthcare consulting only firm.

I previously worked for McKinsey in London and have started a blog about consulting and how to get into it at www.theconsultingcoach.com
 

I know it's an old thread but I thought that it wpuld be good to have thr info out there. I am a PhD candidate and recently interviewd with and got offers from BCG and Bain. Both forms offered a Senior Associate with the possibility to get to Consultant in 6months depending on my performance. BCG the title was still Associate but with a ~20% higher than average Associate salary and promise of review in 6 months.

 

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